Amos 4

Listen to this message, you {wealthy} women of {the city of} Samaria! You have indulged yourselves and grown fat, just as the cattle in {the region of} Bashan grow fat. You oppress poor people, and you cause needy people to suffer. Then you say to your husbands, “Bring us {more wine} to drink!” 2 {But} God our Lord says, “Because I am holy, I solemnly promise this: Indeed the time is coming when your enemies will capture you and take you away, {as easily} as someone catches fish with hooks. They will do this to every last one of you. \* 3 The enemies will break through your city walls, and then each of you women will go straight out through the gap in front of her. Each of you will flee toward Harmon. I, God, declare that this will happen. \* 4 {You act like I am telling you this:} Go to {the town of} Bethel and sin! Go to {the town of} Gilgal and sin even more! Bring your animal sacrifices {to the altars there} every morning, and bring a tenth of your crops every third day! 5 Burn bread that contains yeast as an offering to thank me, and announce the offerings that you bring willingly! Make sure to loudly brag {about them}! I say these things because that is what you Israelite people love to do. I, God your Lord, declare this. \* 6 I am also the one who caused you to have no food at all in any of your cities and towns, yet you did not stop sinning and become loyal to me again. I, God, declare this. 7 I am also the one who kept you from getting rain when there were still three months before {your crops were ready to} harvest. {Sometimes} I sent rain on one town and held it back from another town. I made it rain on some fields, but I gave no rain to other fields, so the crops there dried up. \* 8 People from towns without water would stagger to a town that did have water, but they could not get enough water to drink. But even so you did not stop sinning and become loyal to me again. I, God, declare this. 9 I made your crops dry up and have disease. Locusts ate up everything in your many gardens and vineyards and on your fig trees and olive trees, yet you did not stop sinning and become loyal to me again. I, God, declare this. \* 10 I made many of you become diseased, just as I had done to {the people of} Egypt {long ago}. I caused your enemies to kill your young men in wars, and I let your enemies capture your horses. I made you smell the stench {of their corpses} in the camps {where they died}, yet you did not stop sinning and become loyal to me again. I, God, declare this. 11 I destroyed some of you, just as I destroyed {the cities of} Sodom and Gomorrah {long ago}. {Those of} you {who survived} were like a burning stick that someone grabs out of a fire {before it burns up completely}, yet you did not stop sinning and become loyal to me again. I, God, declare this. \* 12 Because of that, you people of Israel, this is what I am going to do to you. And because I am going to do this to you, prepare to {truly} meet me, your God, people of Israel!” 13 Prepare yourselves, because this is who he is: he is the one who formed the mountains and who creates the wind. He reveals to people what they are thinking. He makes the morning light and the darkness. Even the highest mountains are small things to him. He is God, God who commands the heavenly armies; that is his name! \*